Out of the blue PF has provided me with a paper W8BEN after having shares and ETF’s with them since more then 10 years and never even mentioned W8BEN before. I’m not an expert at all but I always thought that W8BEN is only applicable if your broker is not a swiss one???
In any case, I’m not sure if I will get any benefit out of it as I do not have US domiciled shres/ETF in PF but in IB.
W8-BEN is a U.S. tax form which nonresidents may complete to certify their nonresident status and thus benefit from the double taxation treaty (lower withholding).
It has nothing to do with whether your broker is based in Switzerland or abroad. Dutch, German or Swiss brokers - they all provide it (well, not every one maybe, but in all those countries).
Would PF otherwise withhold 45%? (30% + 15% CH?)
So that means W8-BEN doesn’t matter, since you’ll get reimbursed on 30% withholding anyway with DA–1 marked as “Depot Schweiz”?
No, without W8-BEN you get 30% US WHT deducted and 0% R-US (zusätzlicher Steuerrückbehalt). The difference to 15%+15% is visible in broker statements and you need to declare it accordingly. Therefore, the tax authorities will not refund any R-US and you still only get a maximum tax credit of 15% for US WHT.
I‘m wondering, just in principle, if you could apply for a refund of the other 15% from the U.S. After all, it‘s tax withheld and the DTA would still apply, wouldn’t it?
But even if you could, you‘d have to provide the same information to the IRS as on form W-8BEN - and more additional paperwork to prove that this tax was withheld. So totally pointless, if you can easily reduce it through your broker by providing W-8BEN.
This might well be possible but, as you mention, more paperwork. And if successful, you’d likely end up with a US check, for which you may have to pay a fee to deposit in Switzerland.
It doesn’t. 15% is Uncle Sam’s final dues as per the treaty.
We’re talking about the other 15% (when no W-8BEN) is filed.
I misunderstood that. Then the answer is yes in theory but not realistic in practice. That’s the whole point of the Qualified Intermediary regime the US implemented in 2001, which the EU is now slowly trying to implement in its own fashion.
FYI filed it too, but support told me I didn’t need to file to to get the reduced rate per treaty.
(Didn’t want to risk having wrong withholding tho 
)
Apparently PF would apply reduced withholding based on your residence status without a formal W-8 BEN filed.
So I’ve not been able to find a final answer to this quesiton in the whole thread (maybe I missed it somewhere, I’m sorry about that then):
What happens in case of fraud (EDIT: changed from bancrupcy due to what @nabalzbhf said) of interactive brokers, how much of my assets are covered? I’ve read different things in several blogs and on IB.
Here for example @thepoorswiss writes under “Protections”:
The SIPC will protect US Investors. SIPC protects your assets up to 500K USD. On the other hand, SIPC will only protect your cash up to 250K USD. And since Swiss investors are protected like US customers, we also get SIPC protection !
[…]
It is important to note that since Brexit, European investors have been using other entities of IB. In that case, the protection is worse since you will not get SIPC protection on stocks, only FCA. But Swiss investors still have SIPC protection."
Meanwhile Schweizerfinanzblog.org writes:
Einlagensicherung: Offenbar gibt es hier für CH-Kunden eine Änderung, wie uns auf unsere Anfrage am 28.3.2023 seitens des deutschsprachigen IBKR-Support mitgeteilt wurde. So sollen die Barmittel und Wertschriften von CH-Kunden im Konkursfall von IBKR neu durch die britische Organisation FSCS in der Höhe von 85’000 £ geschützt sein statt bisher durch die Securities Investor Protection Corporation (SIPC), welche eine maximale Deckungssumme von 500’000 USD anbot, davon 250’000 für Barmittel.
In another article @thepoorswiss says:
Due to Brexit, many accounts are moved from IB UK to other IB entities in the European Union, such as Luxembourg (IB LUX). So, if your account is moved from the IB UK entity to an IB EU entity, you will now be protected like any other EU broker. It is sad because you will lose the extra SIPC protection. You can look at the next section to see what that means.
Is there a way to find if I’m with IB UK or IB Ireland?
Because looking at this all swiss countries should be with IBIE (Ireland)
Then again… going to this link from IB we seem to be with IBUK. IBLUX is no longer offering investing and IBIE is for EU. And looking unter their own (IBUK) “About Us” > “Client Protection” > “Account protection” it still says:
Interactive Brokers (U.K.) Ltd. (“IBUK”) custodies certain of your securities positions and cash with its US affiliate, Interactive Brokers LLC (“IBLLC”), which is licensed by the US Securities & Exchange Commission and a member of the US Securities Investor Protection Corporation (“SIPC”). To the extent that your securities and cash are custodied at IBLLC, they are protected by SIPC for a maximum coverage of $500,000 (with a cash sublimit of $250,000) and under Interactive Brokers LLC’s excess SIPC policy with certain underwriters at Lloyd’s of London for up to an additional $30 million (with a cash sublimit of $900,000) subject to an aggregate limit of $150 million. […]
So does anyone actually know?
EDIT: Just got an answer from @thepoorswiss himself on his blog 
This comment in the other blog is misleading in my opinion. ETFs are still covered by SIPC on IB UK. The main thing not coveredb by SIPC are things that are not traded through IB US (like CFDs, illegal in the US).
I went on the phone with an expert representative of IB on the subject and they clarified that nothing changed for Swiss investors.
Bankruptcy shouldn’t have any impact on your assets, they’re yours not the broker’s.
Only if there’s margin or fraud involved could it be an issue, otherwise I’d assume the assets would be transferred to another broker’s
Hi,
I use IBKR as my primary and only broker.
Now I reached the point I am not comfortable anymore having all my eggs in one basket, and I am looking to move some investments to a secondary broker.
As of today, I am almost all invested in VT, plus ~100K splitted in 50% CSSPX, 30% MEUD, 20% SMICHA.
I am looking for a secondary broker to invest initially ~200K in different currencies USD, CHF and EUR, probably the same mix I have now.
My strategy will be BUY & HOLD with very few transactions per year, but I want to be ready to close all the positions and maybe also the account if I would ever decide to buy an apartment.
I am very frugal guy, and I don’t like high fees and recurring ones, anyway I prefer to have them clear and upfront, than facing them when I will close the positions, or dealing with sudden changes of the conditions.
For other banking needs I use PostFinance, CLER ZAK and UBS (just for safe deposit box).
I am currently considering both CornerTrader and Degiro as options.
Degiro looks good to me for holding positions, but buying, selling and transferring using different currencies could be very expansive because of their currency handling. Thinking about a portfolio of USD 200K, with 0.25% fee on currency conversion from and to CHF, buying and then selling it all will cost 1K.
CornerTrader looks better to me for their FX fees, buy it is quite more expansive in buying and selling ETFs and they have an inactivity fee, but my biggest concern is that I read in this forum that people leave the platform, because they are bothered by different issues.
I would like to receive your recommendation about my case, these two options or new ones, and in general any other suggestion you would like to share.
Thanks In Advance.
Why not the postfinance platform ? As far as I remember it is a deposit cost of 90 CHF/a which are converted into trading credits.
Disclaimer : not using it, but I would think it is a neat solution in your use case.
EDIT : apparently, you also get a 5 CHF discount on your regular banking package if you have more than 25kCHF in deposits (excluding cash) in your E-finance, lowering your yearly fee to 30 CHF total.
There are other European brokers besides Degiro: flatex, comdirect, even DKB broker is reasonable.
Yes, it is still one of the possible options, but not very good in my perspective.
As of today my position with them is shared with my wife and I don’t think they will let me open a e-trading position on a shared account, hence I would need to open a new account just for me.
Moreover we had bad experience with their currency conversion rates and fees and their USD account was quite limited.
Anyway It will be 90+30 = CHF 120 upfront per year.
Then my trades are usually ~10’000 and the fees per trade on that size are around CHF 50, hence after the first couple of trades the cost per trade it will be quite high in comparison with CT or DG.
This is currently my opinion, but I am still considering.
For DKB I can’t speak a word of german so far.
I don’t know the other 2, I will check them.
Thanks.
EDIT: They look all german only platforms. I cannot use them now. Maybe the best choice would be to invest in learning german.